Anyhow I pulled at last, but there was only a click, and he answered with another like lightning.
That showed me how he meant it, plainer than anything else.

It was too late to get out.

I set my teeth and pulled again ..." "Like the clash of swords," whispered Langholm, in the pause.
Severino moved his head from side to side upon the pillow.
"No, not that time, Langholm.

There was such a report as might have roused the neighborhood--you would have thought--but I forgot to tell you he had shut the window and run up some shutters, and even drawn the curtains, to do for the other houses what the double doors did for his own.

When the smoke lifted, he was lying back in his chair as though he had fallen asleep ...
"I think the worst was waiting for her to come down.